Jazz improvisation often happens in dark clubs or rehearsal spaces, not in computer labs.
But one research team at the University of Arizona is part of a movement to change that. Dr. Clayton Morrison, a professor at the School of Information at UA, is currently working with a team to create artificial intelligence that can play and improvise jazz.
Although his research may be about music, the program called Musica, is actually part of a much larger program at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the research branch of the U.S. Department of Defense.
So how does jazz fit under U.S. security?
Musica is housed under the Communicating with Computers programs. Morrison explains that it’s about creating computer systems that can think on the fly, negotiate within boundaries — like in jazz, communicate their thoughts and thought processes to the outside world, and “become equal participants in the conversation.”
The vision he says is “computers as collaborators, not as impenetrable black boxes we don’t understand.”
Artificial Intelligence has a long way to go but also have to be careful about how we use it.